Ep 5. Robbie Kroger of Blood Origins on why hunting is human

Send us a text

Discover the hidden dimensions of hunting with Robbie Kroger from Blood Origins as we unravel the impact of this ancient practice on conservation and community. Robbie, with his infectious enthusiasm and wealth of knowledge, dismantles the elitist stereotypes surrounding trophy hunting, revealing its true economic and educational significance. Our conversation delves into the transformation of Blood Origins into a powerful voice for the hunting narrative.

Embark on a journey through personal hunting tales and the hard-to-balance equation of work, family, and the call of the wild. Through my personal reflections on joining the hunting world later in life to Robbie's six steps of becoming a hunter, we unmask the emotional investment and heritage that fuel our pursuits. We probe into the complexities of running a non-profit like Blood Origins, and how Robbie's commitment to telling the unfiltered stories of hunters is creating a new paradigm in the hunting space.

Finally, we tackle some of the most pressing debates within the hunting community. The discussion moves from the surprising source of internal backlash to the innovative ways Blood Origins is educating people on the conservation benefits of regulated hunting. We share a thrilling account of fundraising success at the Weatherby event, setting a precedent for future conservation endeavors. So, tune in and be part of a conversation that's as much about the heart and heritage of hunting as it is about the hunt itself.

For the latest information, news, giveaways and anything mentioned on the show head over to our Facebook, Instagram or website.

If you have a question, comment, topic, gear review suggestion or a guest that you'd like to hear on the show, shoot an email to [e-mail] or via our socials.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
On the fifth episode Back your Hunts.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
And that Facebook group grew to 4,000 people very
quickly and then we died inAustralia.
We just lost momentum.
A lot of people are like oh,robbie, you must get to hunt
like crazy.
Now, like in 2022, I'll hunt tothe day and a half.

(00:29):
We have a lot of conversationsaround trophy hunting.
That is the big emotional topic.
It's an emotional topic, butI've come to realise that more
often than not, when it comes toyou know, again it's a
bastardised term by the auntiesto get rid of hunting.
But now in the huntingcommunity it's been picked up

(00:50):
and you're like oh, it's anelitist kind of scenario.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
Welcome back to another episode of Acura Hunts,
a Life Outdoors Special guestcoming to us from multiple
different locations background,but currently out of the United
States.
We've got Robbie Kroger fromBlood Origins.
Welcome to the show.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Thanks, dodge.
Much appreciate you, and giventhat this is dropping when it's
dropping, as I said, I apologisefor not drawing your name out
of the raffle.
The Aussie raffle.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, we've got a bad line, we're going to end this
conversation.

Speaker 2 (01:32):
And you aren't the first to tell me.
There were like a couple peopleand it's the classic right.
Oh my God, my wife found outhow much money I spent.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
And what did I say to you, though it wasn't a spend.

Speaker 2 (01:45):
Exactly.
You said it was supportingBlood Origins mission in
Australia, which is exactly thepoint.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
I think I said to my wife I was investing in my
children's future in hunting100% 100% and that's what.

Speaker 2 (01:59):
Look, all kidding aside, all kidding aside, that
is what we're about, and I thinkthat the reason why Blood
Origins Australia is primed nowis that there is a narrative to
be said, and I think thatthere's some great, great, great
hunting organisations inAustralia, but and there's great

(02:20):
hunting organisations inAmerica and great hunting
organisations in Europe, yetthey all seem to be looking at
us going what are you doing?
That's different, becauseyou're doing something different
, and I think what we're doingdifferent is that we're reaching
people who really didn't quitehave an understanding of hunting

(02:40):
and now they're like oh, Iunderstand now.
Oh, I didn't quite know that.
Oh, wow, there's an economicimpact to duck hunters, to duck
hunting in the rural landscapeof Victoria, Australia, that the
local bottle-o or the campsite,the RV guy or the baker they

(03:04):
actually value people coming toduck hunt.
I've never heard that before.
Huh, I didn't know that that'swhat we do For people that don't
know who are.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
You obviously dropping words like bottle-o, so
I want to just reference thefact that you've got I've got it
written here because it was along list Born in Brazil, moved
to South Africa, young, halfAustralian, with an Australian
mother living in Mississippi, soyou've got a fair bit of Living
in Tennessee now 20, 20 years20 years in Mississippi and now
I'm in Tennessee.

Speaker 2 (03:35):
Yeah, I've got the.
There's a dark side of myfamily, which is the Australian
side of my family.
You know we don't like to talkabout that side of the family.

Speaker 1 (03:43):
Well, I hope they listen in and they can hear from
you occasionally.
But now you've got a fair graspon all those areas and I've
been following you for a littlewhile now probably not from the
beginning, like some and Isuppose you popped up recently
and that's what sparked me toreach out and just say, hey,
let's have a quick chat.
And that was from this, I wantto say raffle that you're

(04:06):
wearing, but it was more of adonation style situation.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
Yeah, so you know blood origins Australia.
When we, when we firstconverted ourselves into a 501
C3 back in 2020 at the beginningof COVID, Just out of interest,
what oh so, oh so, in Americato be an NPO, a non-profit
organization, you register withthe federal government and your

(04:31):
registration designation inAmerica is a is 501 C3.
That's your charitabledesignation.
There are other NPOdesignations like 501 C4, which
means you're a politicaladvocacy lobbying organization

(04:52):
and you can use your money forpolitical activities.
A 501 C3 cannot touch that witha 10 foot pop, Otherwise you
lose your charitable designation.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
That's a safe spot for you to be in.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
Yeah, and so it's a tax deductible organization.
We don't make any profit andanyone who donates towards us
can write those, those monies,off against their taxes.
Nice, I'll note that.
And so we.
That's what we did in 2020,because we didn't have a

(05:25):
business model before that.
We had a brand, we had a like apersona, we had a message.
But, just like everybody else inthe world who lives in the
hunting space, who works in thehunting space, that enjoys
hunting there's not millionsthat would be an exaggeration
Tens of thousands of people thatsay I want a hunting show.

(05:46):
I'll be honest, I've been in alot of those in 2017.
I actually didn't know what Iwanted, but that's where I was
thought we wanted to go.
And so we didn't have abusiness model to survive,
because everybody who we askedfor money said no, but

(06:07):
rightfully so.
We hadn't proved ourselves, andthere were 10,000 other people
asking for money, and so we justkept going and going, and going
, and going and going.
And that's my personality I'm apatiently persistent individual
, and you will not find a morepatiently persistent individual
than me.
And so, as we started buildingout the charity side, we finally

(06:29):
had a model that could acceptrevenue, that could accept
donations that then could keepus alive and allow us to grow.
And so I was like, man, we needto start increasing.
And we started.
Then, unbelievably, our globalfingerprint just was massive,
like we had people interactingfrom New Zealand, australia,
spain, pakistan, south Africa,tanzania, argentina.

(06:51):
They were just like boom boom,boom, boom, boom.
I was like, okay, this is,we've done something different
here.
All right, so now we need to.
In my brain, I was like, allright, we need to.
We need to sort of establishagain I didn't want to be the
same same same.
I didn't want to have chaptersor anything.
So let's build like affiliatesin these different countries to
like represent us.
And so how do you do that?

(07:13):
Well, one of the ways that wedid it to initially was we did a
private Facebook group calledBlood Origins Australia, and
that Facebook group grew to4,000 people very quickly, and
then we died in Australia.
We just lost momentum, and thereason we lost momentum was we

(07:37):
didn't have any money.
We had just started thischarity that was barely keeping
itself alive, and then, inAustralia, I think, a couple of
things happened.
We don't have money to createcontent and to the Australian
people and communities, a veryunique beast in that it's almost

(07:59):
like you don't care aboutwhat's happening in America.
You don't care what's happeningaround the world.
What's happening in yourbackyard is what matters the
most.
And here was a guy from, born inBrazil, lived in South Africa,
is now in Mississippi being theface of something that's
happening in Australia.
And some people like that'sfine.

(08:19):
Others are like whoa, what'sgoing on here?
And so I think we just sort oflulled.
We just like, and I was likeman, what do we need to get
going?
And all through 23 hours, like,okay, 2024 is the year we are
going to take blood originsAustralia to where it needs to

(08:40):
go, or we're going to just like,sort of leave it be.
And I was like well, how do I dothat?
And again, we had done it right.
We built the relationships, webuilt the.
We've got enough sort of brandawareness.
And I said, okay, I want to dosomething that can raise money

(09:01):
and get people interested.
The raffle was the way to go.
And I was like well, I don'twant to just do a simple raffle
because I want it.
I want it in and out.
I want people to like, be, likeyes, I'm in, knock it out close
, it be done, and I want peopleto have a really, really good
chance of winning.
And so we did that raffle threeamazing hunts in Australia,

(09:26):
hundred tickets, 300 ticketsyour chances are super high and
in my brain, in my thoughtprocesses, it's now an anchor
for what we do in Australia.
So hearing here on the accuratehunts podcast for the first
time telling everyone what I'mgoing to do next year for the

(09:46):
raffle and this will make, Iknow you were depressed when I
first told you, but now you maybe a little, a little happier.
We'll wait and see.
Yeah, go, I want to do apreference point system for next
year's raffle.
So everyone who bought ticketsthis year regard in terms of

(10:07):
like how many tickets you boughtyou will get a extra ticket if
you come in next year for allthe tickets that you bought this
year.
So what does that do?
Dodge it incentivizes everyonewho put in money, who didn't win
, to do it again, but also maybehalf of them won't, and if half

(10:31):
of them don't, that means thepeople who did and that come
back.
Their chances go through theroof.
I'm not going to do it forever.
I may do it on a two year orthree year cycle preference
points and then wipe the slateclean and then start again.
But it's a way to, as I did.
As you asked how's the rafflegoing?
We were not.
I did not intend to open theraffle until Jan 2nd.

(10:55):
When we posted that thing onJan 1st on my time, jan 2nd,
your time people were likewhere's the link?
I was like, all right, I'lljust soft launch it.
In 12 hours we had sold 50% ofthe tickets In 40, less than 48
hours it was done.
That's no soft launch.
It was like poof and I thinkyou know people were ready for

(11:17):
it and it was a perfect timing.
It got around quick enough andI think we're going to just keep
doing it every single year.

Speaker 1 (11:24):
Did you see an increase in your closed page
from it as?

Speaker 2 (11:29):
far as people following.
No, no, no, no.
There wasn't really anybody whocame into the page, because
it's tough, you have to invitepeople into the closed page, and
that's something I need tothink about is how do we do that
?
Do we open it up?
It's closed because we have.
We have control.
We have control of who comes in.
We have control of who sayssomething.
We have control of what'sposted.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
I don't think that's a bad thing.
Our local hunting club here hastwo pages one public one, one
closed one.
Some things go across both, butthere's reasons for what stays
closed.

Speaker 2 (12:02):
Yeah, so, um, so, yeah, we've got as I said.
Now the money's going to beused to.
Well, that's the next questionCreate great content.
We're going to do what we dobest in Australia.
You're creating Australiancontent, australian content, yep
.
So we've actually got a filmcoming out at the end of January
that we've partnered on already.

(12:24):
We've got some ideas in NewSouth Wales, in the rural places
of New South Wales, to talk tothe people you know about what
their perceptions are aroundhunting again what we do.
We've got the same ideas inrural Victoria for duck hunting.
We're going to invest in somewriting so that we can write

(12:45):
some opinion pieces to getpushed into the press sphere in
and around Australia.
We're going to invest in someSEO around those articles so
that when people Google, oh,duck hunting Victoria, we want
our content to be like thethings that hit the top of the
internet search list.
We're also going to invest veryheavily in the food element of

(13:09):
venison in Australia in 2024.

Speaker 1 (13:11):
And we're going to invest, yeah, we're talking.

Speaker 2 (13:13):
Now we're going to invest in content from the
backyard barbecue, wheresomeone's doing backyard
barbecue style venison, invitingfriends over connecting, and
most All of these gatherings aregoing to be a hunter, inviting
non-hunting friends to come andenjoy venison for the first time
To ultra high-end chef in arestaurant.

(13:35):
So we're going to have a wholesetup where it's going to be.
You know the fancy plating,what not?
You know high-end individualshopefully come in non-hunters
and get their content around.
You know what they feel aboutwhat they ate and their
perceptions around hunting andthen obviously get all that
content and push it out.
And to push it out into theright hands in the Australian

(13:59):
market requires money, and nowwe have it.

Speaker 1 (14:03):
I don't think.
I want to say I don't thinkmost of the people that invested
and bought tickets thoughtabout any of that.
They're probably juststarstruck and like, oh, I
wouldn't want to bend Tanghunt.
That's the point.
That's the point, yeah, yeah.
Well, we had a double-edgedadvantage for them, though they
get the chance to win a prizeand then we get a chance to,

(14:24):
like I said, invest in ourfuture.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
Yeah, and I think it's imperative on me and what
we're going to do in bloodorigins Australia to show where
the money went, to say hey andconstantly all through the year.
Remember you did this, this iswhat came from it.
Remember you did this, this iswhat came from it.

Speaker 1 (14:42):
It caused an effect.
This is the result.
We have you know them anywaybut a lot of larger
organizations in Australia thatsit on a lot of money Like what
for?

Speaker 2 (14:52):
It's our memberships.
Why is?

Speaker 1 (14:55):
it just sitting in their account accruing interest.
So it's nice to see someoneputting their foot forward and
actually doing something.

Speaker 2 (15:04):
Yeah, I'm excited, dude.
I'm really, really excited and,as I said, I plan to.
I probably plan to overspend,like I'm going to go way over
what we did bring in, because Iwant to make a difference, like
I really, really want to make animpact this year so that when
we go into 2025, people are likeoh yeah, 12 hours, boom, the

(15:24):
raffle's done, it's out of there, and then maybe we have a
second raffle halfway throughthe year, same situation, kind
of scenario.

Speaker 1 (15:32):
No, that's exciting.
Disappointed I didn't win.
I'll be in next year for thepreference points.
That's a very American systemtoo, the preference points.
Obviously we don't have a tagsystem here on well only on Hog
D really.

Speaker 2 (15:45):
But I just want to constantly think outside the box
, Like what people are, like howcan we?
Obviously we want to spurpeople's interest, to get back
in so that we are raising themoney, but also, again, I want
to be very I want to try and beas fair as I possibly can to say

(16:05):
to someone hey, you've got agood chance.

Speaker 1 (16:12):
And it was great odds .

Speaker 2 (16:14):
Yeah, it was great odds.
Yep, yep, no one in a hundred.

Speaker 1 (16:18):
Well, yeah, 300 tickets in total.
Yeah, so I don't.
I suppose some people listeningprobably don't even know who
you are at this point, but Idon't really want to go into
blood origins history too much,but just the choice of words and
the name itself I kind of wantto focus and ask you about
because it's too military, Idon't know.

(16:40):
It's two interesting words andthen when you join them together
you know it makes a cute littlebusiness name, but why choose
those two words specifically?
Obviously I'm a bit of areligious person I'm not sure if
you are or not, but obviouslysacrifice and things is
something that started rightfrom the start.
So there's a lot of blood andthat is the origin of life is

(17:03):
blood.
So I'd like to know what yourfeelings behind those two words
are.

Speaker 2 (17:09):
Yeah, I'm a man of faith too and actually didn't
start as blood origins.
It started the name actuallywas in the blood and when we
started I got some great advicefrom some very high end people
in the outdoor industry and theysaid do you own it Like Dodge?

(17:32):
Do you own accurate hunts?
Yes, I do.
And so I was like huh.
I said, yeah, there's somebodythat has like fire in the blood
as a name.
And then there was another kindof.
There was a kid in Wisconsin atthe time that had in the blood
outdoors and the persons that Iwas talking to said change your

(17:53):
name right now, pivot out rightnow, before you have emotional
heartache in three years timewhen someone does something and
they mistake it for you andyou're in a legal battle and you
have to change your name then.
So I really thought deep andhard about like what are we
wanting to do?
What are we wanting to capture?
And at the time we werecapturing like someone's heart,

(18:13):
someone's why.
And someone's why is typicallydriven by their culture, by
their upbringing, by theirheritage, by their parents, by
their grandparents, which isessentially your origins, so
where you come from.
But probably more deeplyingrained biologically,

(18:35):
genetically, your origins comefrom the DNA that's flowing in
the side of you.
You know that's in your blood,essentially, and so everybody
has blood.
Everyone has this thing that ismade, makes up your body, that
is again made up of the heritage, the lineage of people that

(18:57):
have come behind you, and that'swhy blood origins is what it is
.
And a lot of people said, oh,you picked the wrong name.
It's like, oh, blood, and youguys spill blood and you kill
animals, and I was like, no, notreally, it's got nothing to do
with that actually.
So, yeah, that's why we calledit blood origins, and I think

(19:19):
the funniest part about the nameis that some people struggle to
say it because they say bloodorange instead of blood orange.
So what are my lots ofAmericans?
And so my greatest achievement,hopefully in 2024, is I'm going

(19:41):
to do a beer collaboration witha beer company and it's a blood
orange beer supporting bloodorigins.

Speaker 1 (19:49):
Yeah, well, that'll confuse the issue a little bit
more.
Yeah, exactly so my blood andorigins in the hunting area.
I came later in life, 1920 orso, when I got into it and I
sort of differentiate betweenshooting and hunting.

(20:11):
I started off in the shootingside of things and moved into
hunting.

Speaker 2 (20:16):
In the pistol shooting or rifle shooting bull
hunting.
No no, I've got one behind me,that's next to you.
You mean your family?

Speaker 1 (20:25):
My family had no background in hunting or
shooting Gotcha.

Speaker 2 (20:28):
Gotcha.

Speaker 1 (20:29):
I sort of I'll explain what I just said there.
In reference to Australianshooters, I would say that
shooters can progress intohunters.
Some people start as huntersand never miss the shooting part
, but most people in Australiaseem to start as shooters roo
shooting, fox shooting, rabbitshooting and then move into the
stalking and the hunting andpursuing in a slightly different

(20:51):
manner.
I did that progress and I sortof I'll talk about a bit later
I'm doing some education coursestuff and I talk about six steps
of being a hunter and startingat shooting, finishing it, being
able to go home withoutsomething and still being happy
about it.
I'm not at that stage yet,because it's still.
I don't win a raffle makes me abit cranky, but I'm enjoying

(21:13):
the journey and I want to knowwhere you're at on that journey.
Shit man, I'm still not at thatpoint.

Speaker 2 (21:22):
Yeah, I'm still not at that point where you like,
you're happy man because andhere's why it's like I've got a
small, I've got a young family,I've got my boys are 10 and 12.
I also have blood origins,which is something that I'm
building, it's my baby, it's mypassion, and so when I go

(21:43):
hunting I know you're notsupposed to be this way, but I
want, I want to take somethinghome.
That's where I'm at, you knowI'm.
I hunt because the reason I'mhunting is because I want to.
This may be controversial, sohold on to your seeds, but

(22:06):
because I intend to killsomething and I intend to bring
something home.
Otherwise I'd go hiking, okay,We'll pick golf.
Yeah.
So when that doesn't happen andI'm unsuccessful, I'm upset.
And I'm upset because I'm notupset at like not being able to

(22:28):
do that thing that I wanted todo.
It's more like excuse mylanguage, I just wasted in my
brain at the time.
I just wasted five days when Icould have been five days with
my family, or I could have beeninvesting in blood origins for
five days.
I'm not.

(22:50):
I'm.
I'm still not in the in themindset and I know I need to get
better at it of like hey,robbie, that was good for you.
Yeah, you, you need the balance.

Speaker 1 (23:02):
In hindsight, are you realizing that that was an
investment in your family,because of an investment in you
and some quiet time, orinvestment in blood origins,
cause you're out there?
I know you're out of phonereach and that would drive your
nuts having notifications builtup, but I honestly wish it was.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
That's the other thing.
Most often I'm not out of phonereach.

Speaker 1 (23:25):
And so I'm not.

Speaker 2 (23:26):
Yeah, that is true, that is true, and I don't do it
and I think I need to like thisyear again.
Those are one of the thingsthat I think through, like, okay
, what are you going to dodifferently this year, robbie?
And one of the things is I Idon't a lot of people like, oh,
robbie, you must get to huntlike crazy now, like in 2022, I
hunted a day and a half, total23.

(23:51):
I did better, um, but 24, Ineed to.
What I need to do in 2024 is Iliterally need to go on a hunt
for three days or whatever it is, or five days, and literally do
not turn my phone on for fivedays, completely disconnect from
the world that I'm in.

(24:11):
I actually need to do it moreweekly, like on a Sunday.
I need to just be like this isa no phone Sunday because it's a
24 seven job that I have rightnow.
Like you're not yeah, we're onthe same day right now because I
woke up really early, buttypically I wake up and
Australia's asleep already, butAustralia's been awake the

(24:33):
entire time.
I've been asleep and my phoneis just full of Australian and
New Zealand messages, and thenSouth African you know the
African continent up for sixhours whilst I'm asleep, and I
wake up to that, so it'sconstant.

Speaker 1 (24:49):
The world never sleeps.

Speaker 2 (24:51):
No, it doesn't, man, it doesn't.
I'm not complaining, don't getme wrong.
I love it.
I absolutely love the networkwe have, but I've got to look
after, I've got to figure out Ican't burn myself out and I've
just got to figure out thebalance.

Speaker 1 (25:06):
I feel like you and I probably on the same sort of
level there with and I'll askyour wife's opinion and what she
tells you, but mine'sdefinitely the same as if I come
home empty handed, meaning nomeat or no antlers or whatever I
was chasing.
Then they see, she sees that asunsuccessful as well.

Speaker 2 (25:28):
Yeah, what the hell were you doing Like?
Why'd you just leave me forfive days?

Speaker 1 (25:32):
Yeah, and then you know there's that little
pressure of the same comment youjust said.
I spent five days away from thekids for no real benefit and
you got kids.

Speaker 2 (25:42):
I don't get the realization.

Speaker 1 (25:43):
Yeah, I got two on the ground and one on the way.

Speaker 2 (25:46):
Oh wow, I knew you were better man than me.

Speaker 1 (25:49):
A little bit younger than you, yeah, or make more
mistakes than you, but I got tonearly five, nearly two and,
yeah, due in March, so which isbig rut.

Speaker 2 (26:01):
So I'll be listen, I actually did you a favor, not
pulling your name out of the hatthen, no, no, you didn't.

Speaker 1 (26:08):
I tried to justify it .
I tried to justify it.
I would have my wife's veryforgiving accepting of things.
But I bought two tickets intoyour super raffle.
I bought the and you did well.
You did well.
Well, I didn't.
I didn't win, but in my mind Isaid once for me and once for
her, but if I ever won, it wouldhave been my ticket that won.

(26:30):
But yeah, I don't know whatyour wife thinks of that, but it
is definitely a bit of pressurefrom mine.
And again what you said there,I get the comment all the time
oh, you live in the dream,you're guiding or you're always
hunting or you're doingsomething.
I'm rarely, ever pulling thetrigger.

Speaker 2 (26:48):
I might be out in the bush, but there's always
something else going on withsomeone or setting something up,
organizing something.

Speaker 1 (26:55):
I love it and that's why I do it, but people don't
see the hours behind.
Like you said, it's 10 o'clockhere, or 10 30 at night, and
I've got a couple of hours withyou and then a couple of hours
after that getting ready forthis trip.

Speaker 2 (27:07):
So, yeah, no, wife doesn't vocalize anything and I
don't think she minds, because Ithink she's already.
I think she's gotten to thepoint where I think she knows
that and I haven't gotten theyet, that I need it.
Like she'll even say why didn'tyou take one to go hunting this
last week?
You've been home the entiretime why didn't you go hunting?

(27:28):
And it's also I'm actually I.
When you get your wife to thispoint, this will be a good thing
.
My wife sometimes is like wait,don't you have a trip coming up
?
Don't you need like just getout the house?
She's like tired of me beingaround.
So that's a good, that's a goodposition to be I look forward
to getting that.

Speaker 1 (27:48):
I'm at the stage where one I hope you're not
listening to this, but I wouldput forward three or four trips,
knowing that two of them Ididn't really want to do, so
that she can can two of them andthen, if one of them gets
through, that's the one I reallywanted to get over the
strategic planning.

Speaker 2 (28:07):
So, no, she's good with it.
She's good with it, man.
She's just like, and you knowto your point about like, yeah,
you live the, the, the high life.
I also, I'm always, as I said,I'm always constantly thinking
about content, always, and so,and that's cause, that's my job
and that's also.
You know, I don't really notthat I don't enjoy it, I love it

(28:30):
.
It's just I'm just constantlylike, oh, if you're going to do
that, oh, we need to do this, weneed to do this, we need to do
this, we need to do this, yeah,and that's, I suppose, the two
words constant, content.

Speaker 1 (28:41):
You know the nearly spelled the same system that's
happening.
Is it just you behind thebusiness?
So we got staff.

Speaker 2 (28:49):
Yeah, so I'm the only paid employee of blood origins
and that only started lastJanuary, so we've only been on
for a year, as before that I wasdoing a full time consulting
job and blood origins at thesame time.
So essentially I did two fulltime jobs for four years and
then built blood origins to thepoint where the board because

(29:10):
again on the nonprofit side andSouth out in America, you have
to have a board of directorsthat run the nonprofit it
doesn't belong to anyone and Iwas on the board until the board
offered me the job of theexecutive director and then I
got kicked off the board.
So it's, if we're not doingwhat we're doing, the board's

(29:31):
going to be like, hey, we'regoing to get another executive
director and I'm out.
That's the situation I'm inright now.
Yeah, who's the board?
Though?
We have four people on theboard right now.
The board voted to be a verysmall nimble board, so we only
we have six people on the boardat one time, and so we're not
like a cruiser or a tanker shipin terms of when we need to turn

(29:54):
or be nimble or change things.
The board is pretty much likeRobbie you do what you do, say
what you say and if you get.
If you get in trouble that'swhy we have lawyers We'll back
you.

Speaker 1 (30:06):
So how are they involved in the hunting
community, or are they not?

Speaker 2 (30:10):
They're not benefit Some of them.
So Christie Plott.
So the incoming chair of theboard is Christie Plott.
She was a non-hunter.
She actually just killed herfirst deer a week ago.
She is in the tannery business.
She's in.
She's in the biggest alligatortannery in America.
So she understands sustainableuse, she understands consumptive

(30:35):
use, but she's not well.
She wasn't a hunter until veryrecently.
Trevor Bacon is in the marineconservation space.
He's a hunter.
Pato Bryan is in the roofingand guttering space.
He's a big hunter.
And then Denise Welker is.
She's the chair right now.
She's a hunter out of Texas.

Speaker 1 (30:58):
And these are people you met along the way.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (31:01):
These are people that have interacted with us and
they've all.
Denise was the.
Denise and her family were thefirst people to actually, when
we were on the cusp of bloodorigins either making it or
dying which is the year beforethe nonprofit I sold a film to a
foundation about them.

(31:23):
That was the only way I wasgoing to survive and in order to
do that I had to sell anauction item which was telling
someone's story.
I source stories from them,from my dad who's out to the
world of art and I work on themand this was the idea I couldn't
have super far or ever.
And then I finally turn afteryou and the welcas bought it and
I got to know the welcas and Iwas like, oh, this is just going
to be, you know me having totell someone's story because
they paid before it.
But it turned out that theywere just an amazing, amazing

(31:44):
people and one night drinkingwine late into the evening it
was her husband, brian turned tome and was like man, I feel
like I've known you for likeyears.
I was like man, same here, andthat's how it started.
And then Pat O'Brien stood intomy DMs about getting to know an

(32:06):
outfitter in South Africa thatwas doing amazing work for rural
kids in a hostel and supplyingmeat to a hostel that didn't
couldn't get meat.
We'd get a very small ration ofmeat from the government every
every month, and so the huntingfraternity was supplying me to
this orphanage, this hostel,every month.
I thought it was the mostamazing story and I wanted to
and this was I wanted to raisemoney over.

(32:28):
Covid was like our secondconservation project ever,
because nobody was hunting, sothere's no food going to the,
the orphanage.
I was like, well, how can wehelp?
They're like, well, we need tocull animals and that costs
money.
I was like I'll raise the moneyand I raised very small amount.
I raised like 40% of what Ineeded and Pat O'Brien goes,

(32:48):
I'll take care of the other 60%.
And so we just got to know eachother then and then again
Trevor Bacon came in as acontact, as a relationship
contact, and then Christie cameway out the blue like somebody
was hunting with her dad andjust hey, get to know Christie,
she's a cool chick.
And that was that.

Speaker 1 (33:10):
You said it then and it was the turning point and
what got you over it.
But it was the creating a why.
Someone else and I know you youdo a lot of videos and a lot of
them.
It's what's our why of 2023, orjust what's our why, and you've
spoken about it and you see itcome through in your videos of
the way you interview and it'sthis what we're doing now, face

(33:31):
to face.
It's it's you talking to meright now, but anyone watching
this on YouTube, it's youtalking to them and it's you
really showing us the why andit's a real hole in the hunting
market and that's you said atthe start with people.
Everyone wanted to be show, butthat's, that's the, what it's

(33:55):
does.
It's not the why, and I thinkthat's why you've hit it and
that's why it's reallysteamrolling now.
I say it with my guys at work.
I'm a fence.
When they come on board, Iteach them what to do initially,
but then eventually I'll teachthem the why.
I don't need them to know thewhy straight away because they
asked him any questions, justjust know what to do and when to

(34:17):
do it, and then you learn thewhy and I think you're really
doing a really good job ofpushing that.
Especially in the Australianindustry, we do a not bit of an
injustice in just showing photosof dead animals and things like
that with not a lot of context.
And I do that on purpose,sometimes just to stir a little

(34:38):
bit of conversation.
And I did a shot of rhino whenI was over in SA with the dart
and and it was an amazingexperience to be a part of, but
I nearly did it on purpose tostart a conversation.
It cost me money, but that wasan investment in just me
stirring people.
But I came over here and then Idid a talk at a hunting club

(35:00):
dinner and it was theconservation conversation and I
started telling the story aboutthe rhino and there was people.
There was a flyer made for thatdinner and there was people
that declined their ticketsbecause I was on the flyer with
a rhino, before they even knewthe why.
That was the, that was thepoint.
So I just wanted to thank youfor telling the why, but I just

(35:22):
want to let you know that, well,it's such a good.
I think it's eating.

Speaker 2 (35:25):
Well, I appreciate it .
It's such a good, I think it'sjust such a good narrative
because it's full of emotion,it's vulnerable, it's authentic,
it's all the things that eventhat non hunters can relate
themselves to.
You're not talking about, youknow, killing an animal You're
talking about, like the sense ofadventure, spirit, religion,

(35:48):
tradition, heritage,conservation, management, all
these things that Spin aroundthe why, and I think people can
see someone being genuine andhonest when they talk about
their why.
That's that's what we really,really, really are after.
And then, you know, the knockon a fit from it is is almost

(36:09):
like a peer pressure system andI think that's what blood
origins is doing the best in isthat you just mentioned.
You see us talking about our why, you see us promoting why.
You see us and we're sort ofcommenting in a certain way and
being gentlemanly and beingrespectful and and that's a
little, you know it's gettingsome legs behind it.

(36:30):
It's sort of pervasive in termsof it's.
It's knock on effects thatother people are starting to do
it.
Or when someone jumps on and,you know, start swearing and
calling people names left, rightand center, I guarantee you,
within 10 to 30 minutes you havesomeone coming in that says,
hey, that's not the way that youshould speak to someone Like

(36:53):
Dan, that's good to see andthat's again that's part of the
hunting narrative.
Like people expect hunters tojust be like, oh you know, if
you you know, I can say what Iwant, I can do what I want, you
can't really anymore.

Speaker 1 (37:11):
Now we're all very accountable.

Speaker 2 (37:13):
Yeah, especially in social media, man, it's just
like that's again.
Why, again we, we comment somuch, we get tagged into you
know when?
Again, when I wake up in themorning to my phone, we're
tagged into so many differentposts all around the world and I
will comment on every singleone of them, especially the big

(37:33):
ones, like the 6 millionaccounts, the 500,000 K accounts
, because I'm not interested inchanging that person's mind.
Around hunting, it's a big antihunting post.
People are screaming left,right and center and I'll say
something very respectfully, ina way that hopefully disarms
people.
Just as honest, if it's a bigwhite, you know, fat American

(37:56):
stand sitting behind a line andpeople are this is disgusting.
I was like, yeah, that photo isnot a great photo and I can see
why people hate it.
I really am disarming them like, I agree with you, but don't
get me wrong, I agree with you,but let me tell you something,
and I'm not trying to convincethe person who posted the
picture to change their minds,because that's not going to

(38:18):
happen, but I know 100,000people just read my comment and
I guarantee you I just planted anumber of seeds of doubt.
You know, and I use thisexample, I use this all the time
.
I remember it was one of thesecrazy big posts, was like Jason
Momoa or one of these big,million dollar, million

(38:39):
countercounts and I did a bigthing and one of the persons
that responded was like I'm ableeding heart vegan and even
this guy makes sense to me.

Speaker 1 (38:53):
Doesn't get any better than that.

Speaker 2 (38:54):
That's it, man, and people, and people saw that
right.
How many people saw that andwas like, wow, a vegan's
agreeing with a hunter.

Speaker 1 (39:02):
Okay, Mission accomplished.
Yeah, exactly, it regularlycomes up in conversations in my
life, whether it randomly, justa fencing quote.
Or today we had my son, writeris nearly two, is going to a new
daycare and I'm going tointerview, fill out paperwork at
the new family daycare and it'sjust a lady's house.

(39:24):
She only has four kids a day.
And she said, oh, is thereanything we should know about
your son?
And I said, like, and we'd beenthere for two hours.
So she didn't mean kid things,she meant little idiocy.
And I said, look, I want to letyou know that we're probably
not your typical family thatcomes here and she's, you know,
leaning in.

(39:44):
What do you mean?
And I said it's not uncommonfor us to kill, harvest and
process animals in front of ourchildren.
And he talks about it a lot.
As a two year old, he most ofhis vocabulary is around things
that we do.
And she was not.

(40:06):
She didn't worry about it, shewas appreciative that we told
her that because she'd actuallytaught our daughter.
And she said she taught herlast year.
And she said that makes a lotof sense.
She didn't know that.
And my daughter would saythings like you know, killed the
goat or cut up the sheep, orthere's always something dead on
our kitchen table and youshould take her.

Speaker 2 (40:30):
You should take her a bunch of innocent like bunch of
ground innocent.

Speaker 1 (40:34):
I regularly feed people meat, and it's a great
way to their hearts, is throughtheir mouth.
But it was just.
You know that they are.
You're talking to anti hunters.
I just I'm a big advocate forpeople being articulate in what
we do.
Be calm about it.
No, you're, why know yourpersonal, why I know mine and I

(40:59):
agree with you.
You said it earlier I likekilling stuff.

Speaker 2 (41:04):
I like what you don't .
This is here's, here's let's,here's semantics, here's
semantics.
It's very, very importantbecause I have this conversation
regularly with people, becausewhen you just said that if
somebody is not in the huntingfraternity and hears you,
they're like, oh you see, he's apsychopath, he really, really

(41:26):
enjoys the death of that animal.
No, you actually, in the moment, and that moment is hundreds of
a second, 10,000 of a second inthat moment you are actually,
you have remorse.
You did this.
There's a little bit of sadnessaround that whole exercise.
What you're happy about is theaccomplishment of what you set

(41:50):
out to do.
She went out to to hunt, tofulfill this hunt, to take the
animal and to fulfill theprocess of it.
If you truly liked killing,hear me for what I just said If
you truly liked and lovedkilling In Dodge, you'll be

(42:12):
volunteering your services atthe local Abattoir and you can
get your rocks off all day longkilling animals.

Speaker 1 (42:24):
Yeah, which is a different killing, I agree.

Speaker 2 (42:27):
I just it's, it's.
I've had this a lot withhunters.
They're like well, we have tolove killing.
You love hunting.
You love hunting.
That has a component in itwhich is the kill it is also has

(42:47):
components of failure and chaseand pursuit in it, which you
love as well.
It also has components ofadventure that you love as well.
It also has components oforganic meat that you feed your
family, stock your freeze andgive it to your friends as well.
You don't love killing.

(43:09):
That's why you don't say I'mgoing to go, I'm going killing
today.
No, you're going hunting.

Speaker 1 (43:15):
I agree, I have to change what I say.
I usually follow it up with aconversation, but no, I
definitely need to record whatyou just said and then put it in
my pocket.

Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yeah, it's just again .
We have these conversations alot and I'll tell you what a lot
of hunters get upset at thatpoint.
They're like no, no, no, I likekilling.
And I've had some big, bigaccounts say I like killing and
I was like I don't think you do.
He's like, oh, I do.
I was like, okay, take a stepback.

(43:51):
And if a non-hunter justwatched this interaction, what
did they just take away?

Speaker 1 (43:55):
Yeah, oh, there you go.
I've taken.
I do these conversations onpurpose.
It's me learning as well, so Iappreciate your outlook on that
and that's something you'vealways championed is changing
the narrative, and whether thatbe the narrative of what people
see of hunters, but also whathunters say.

Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yeah, and I think people will say and this is the
other pushback, we get a lot ofright is like, oh, I'm going to
go and get a little bit of that,and I'm like yes and no, maybe
yes, in that I recognize thatthere are people that watch us
interact with us in this newsocial media environment that
don't have an understanding ofhunting.
And can we speak to them?

(44:36):
And I'm like yes and no, maybeyes and no, maybe yes and no,
maybe yes and no, maybe yes andno, maybe yes and no, maybe yes
and no, maybe.
And can we speak to them Likeyou would speak to a hunter,
your buddy down the street?

(44:57):
No, you can't.
And is it inappropriate to tochange how you speak to someone
who has no understanding of whatyou're doing?
No, it's not inappropriate.
It's what we do as society Tomake them understand.

(45:18):
And you change your language tomake people understand and
that's okay, it's not.
You know, again you can get intothe whole conversation of like
a harvest versus kill.
Oh, you're just saying harvestto placate someone.
Maybe I am, because they justdon't understand when I say we
go out and enjoy killing things.

(45:39):
They don't quite understandwhat I just said.
No, we go out and enjoy huntingand then we, you know, like to
harvest the meat.
It's not wrong.
We kill an animal and then weharvest the meat.
Both those terms aretechnically right.
They still apply.
They still apply.
I think what we do is is being,you know, snowflake ish is

(46:05):
being, you know, coddling thenon hunter.
But then again, our wholemission is to talk to non
hunters and so I'm going to doeverything that I can and I'm
going to use every piece ofrhetoric and narrative that I
can to have those conversations.

Speaker 1 (46:26):
I'm just wrapped in truth, though, just a matter of
how you get it across.
I'd liken it to the way thatyou would talk to your colleague
First talking to your boss thesame conversation and we're two
different because you can winchto your colleague, but if you
winch to your boss, bitperceived very differently.
So you use different words andthings to get it across.

Speaker 2 (46:44):
Totally agree.

Speaker 1 (46:46):
Do you think the majority of your backlash is
from the hunting community, ordo you get much backlash?

Speaker 2 (46:55):
We don't.
We do not get much backlash.
It's surprisingly so.
A lot of people would think.
Man geez, robbie's DM issupposed to just full of
fricking people like oh you,bloody murderer, we hardly ever
get it.

Speaker 1 (47:11):
Blood origins Australia Facebook group is
closed.
Do you have that set up in theother countries?
So they are closed communities?
Yep, we have one in.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
Finland, Finland, Spain, Namibia, South Africa.
No, because in our Instagram iscompletely open.
Our major Facebook page iscompletely open.
Our major Facebook page is165,000 people in it.
No, we rarely get.
The only time we get the antihunters climbing into us on
Facebook is when we do Ifthere's a big controversial

(47:41):
African post about you know anelephant or a lion or something
like that.
But I think you're right.
Anytime we get any pushback on,like what we say and how we say
, it typically comes out of thehunting community.

Speaker 1 (47:57):
It's one of our main unduings internal hunter on
Hunter.

Speaker 2 (48:04):
Yeah, yeah, I don't think we're ever going to change
, and the way that I havethought through it is I sort of
I have to take us back like 2000years.
We're all sitting around acampfire, dodge You're sitting
around the campfire, I'm sittingaround the campfire, and that
day you were super successful.

(48:24):
You came in, you bought a big,old, you know piece of meat into
the camp because you hunted itand you drug it back to the
campfire and we're all growlingaround the campfire.
But you get your choice ofwomen that night and you get
your choice of meat that nightand I'm sitting there grumbling

(48:44):
because I don't like it.
Right, I'm upset and I'm, youknow, going to say things that
make makes you know that I don'tlike you or I don't like the
way that you did.
The difference being is that inthat society, the next day I
went out and tried even harderto accomplish what I needed to

(49:06):
do to get the accolades, whentoday's society is just bitching
and moaning on the internet andnot nobody doing anything about
it.

Speaker 1 (49:15):
Throws throws a quick little comment in there on
Facebook.

Speaker 2 (49:19):
Yeah, so I just I say that to say I think that
inherently there's justcompetition.
There's just like primalcompetition in the hunting
fraternity that I think is bornfrom generations of sort of
tribal hunters trying to do eachother.

Speaker 1 (49:40):
You mentioned it before as a man of faith and you
just some of you said then is aconversation I regularly have
with myself.
I don't even know if I've saidthis out loud, but how excited
do you think the first guys werethat cooked meat?
And then and then.
And what was the process?
Was it lightning struck?
Bison got killed in the fireand they're walking over and

(50:03):
they're like oh, actually, Iwill try that medium rare bit of
bison that's burnt in this fireverse the raw stuff we've been
eating for however many years Ithink that's like this.
We never going to know any.

Speaker 2 (50:18):
Well, I think we you get pretty close.
I've had lots of people'sconversations on this on my
podcast of like vegans becomingmeat eaters.
That's as close as you're goingto get to it, in that they've
been like six months withoutmeat.
I had this one guy who went toAustralia and he became a
Jehovah's Witness and he wasliving in that big Jehovah's

(50:40):
Witness colony outside of SydneyUp on the North Shore, I think
there's.
There's one who went allowed toeat meat nothing right and he
got so wasted, like not wasted,like physically wasted away.
He's like he said I had brainfog and whatnot.
He snuck out and he bought oneof the roasted chook and he sat

(51:01):
on the side of the road and heate that roasted chook and he
said his body just like vibratedwith energy, like it was just
like a like this out of bodyexperience at his mind and brain
and his whole, just like, ohman, this is so good.
I mean, that's as close as youcan get to it.

Speaker 1 (51:24):
Yeah, well, I mean Woolies roast chooks.
They do that, that's what he'swatched.
Chooks are good, 10 bucks in abag or whatever it is.
They do a roast pork, which isa little bit more expensive, but
I don't know how they get it soperfect every time.

Speaker 2 (51:38):
It's Willys baby.

Speaker 1 (51:40):
Woolies, yeah, they nail it On the on the education
side of things.
Is there any future in bloodorigins reaching out into that
market?
I mean, obviously everythingyou do is educating that side of
things, but is there some wayfor hunters to be educated and
do better other than justwatching your?

Speaker 2 (51:59):
videos.
I don't think we'll get intolike the formal education space,
like creating tutorials ordoing courses like you're doing
or what like Amon's doing on thewith broadside hunting.
I think we'll leave it to guyslike you guys to do that work
and if we can support them thosekinds of things in the future,

(52:22):
then maybe that's where we canwe can come in.
But what we are doing is, asyou said, I think we're
educating all the time and I'mvery cognizant of trying to put
information out that isconstantly planting seeds in
people's brains so that the nexttime someone has a conversation
or they see something online.
I'll use an example.

(52:45):
I can't believe someone huntselephants.
They're endangered.
They've heard me say in thepast yes, you're right,
elephants are endangered, but doyou know that there are only
400 elephants in Botswana a yearand there's a population of
130,000.
Which means they're onlykilling 0.1% of the population.

(53:06):
That has a growth rate of 7% ayear.
It's overpopulated and huntinghas no effect on the population.
I wish I hope that people aretaking those pieces of
information that we areconstantly pushing out and
getting enough confidence withinthemselves to say something

(53:26):
like that at a dinner table oronline or respond to a comment
and say I didn't, you know, Iknow this, but if you want more
information, go see BloodOrigins.
That happens a lot nowadays,which is where we want to be.

Speaker 1 (53:39):
Your reference point yeah, I've sent some people your
way.
My personal, with accuratehunts and things is mostly being
around trophy hunting andthat's a niche market here in
Australia Some guys that do itreally quietly and then not many
that do it super publicly.
And it's because of thatinfighting between hunters and

(54:02):
just recently someone we sort ofparted ways because they didn't
.
They said they didn't like mymorals around hunting and
focusing on trophies.
So I sort of I really drew, wasdrawn to your videos where that
you were focusing on thebenefits of that side of it and
debunking myths, I suppose yeah,and we have a lot of

(54:23):
conversations around trophyhunting.

Speaker 2 (54:24):
Okay, that is the big question, it's an emotional
topic.
It's an emotional topic, butI've come to realize that more
often than not, when it comes,you know again, it's a
bastardized term by the auntiesto get rid of hunting.
But now in the huntingcommunity it's been picked up
and be like oh, it's an elitistkind of scenario.

(54:45):
Okay, so the way that I tackleit within the hunting community
is this now is like if let's goback to the buddy that you've
just parted ways with, I assumehe was not a trophy hunter.
Okay, I'm going to make thatassumption.
So then I'm going to say, okay,if I was in front of that

(55:06):
individual talking to him and hewas like I get, I'm, I don't
like your method, I think youguys are doing it the wrong way.
Like, okay, you like to huntbuddy X?
He says, yes, okay, would youconsider yourself a meat hunter
or trophy hunter?
And he says I'm a meat hunteronly.
Fair enough, perfect.

(55:29):
So that means every time you gohunt the very first animal you
see, you kill it right andthat's it You're done.
More often than not, the answeris going to be no.
And if the answer is no, wellwhy?

(55:49):
Why didn't you kill that firstanimal that you saw?
You said you're a meat hunter.
That was meat.
Oh, it was too small, oh, itwas too young.
So you just put a value, apersonal value, on an animal

(56:14):
that you decided to either takeor not take Sounds like a trophy
hunter to me.
It's just a value.
You're just putting a value onan animal.
That value is determined by theperson who's hunting.
The value could be big antlers.

(56:35):
Value could be a big old fatdoe or hind, or it doesn't
matter.
I'm actually after a very younganimal because that's the
tastiest meat to me.
What's the difference?

Speaker 1 (56:53):
I've had that conversation with him
specifically.

Speaker 2 (56:57):
What do you say?

Speaker 1 (57:01):
There's a bit of background.
Some people might know who theperson is, but there was no
changing his mind.
He didn't say that to my face,he said that to someone else as
to why he parted ways.
I've had that very similardiscussion of if you're
selecting for meat or that'sstill selecting, that's your

(57:24):
trophy.
It just doesn't hang on yourwall.
It's in your fridge, in yourcool room.

Speaker 2 (57:30):
There's also a connotation that, just because
you're a trophy hunter andyou're selecting for a trophy
from an antler perspective, thatthe meat stayed on the mountain
.
No, it didn't.
It ended up in the fridge too.
It hung up in the fridge too,just like any other animal.

Speaker 1 (57:50):
Yeah, we have a cool room at home and antlers are not
a fair chunk of it and not allof it.
I'm not scared to say that Idon't take all of every animal
sometimes and that doesn't worryme too much.
It definitely worries somepeople over here that there's a
real push at the moment through.
I don't know what the reason is, and maybe it's fear of

(58:14):
persecution from other hunters.
I took everything from thisanimal, everything's coming home
, or I took all the meat.
It's not if you're backpackingin somewhere and you've already
got 25 or 30 kilos on your backbecause you've been in there for
10 days.
You're not taking out a fullsamba, unless you're doing
multiple trips.

Speaker 2 (58:31):
But yeah, I think sorry, in Pakistan, the guys
there will say to the trophyhunters they're like you take
the antlers, you take the cape.
It's the thing.
That's the thing that's mostworthless to us.
We just want to meet.
We just want to meet.

Speaker 1 (58:50):
Yeah, unfortunately we don't have workers that will
work for us, follow us aroundfor that sort of doll of a.
It's the same in South Africa,you know.
You're never far from a buckyand if you can't get one in
close, they'll cut their way in,and that's right, and anything
to get the animal out.

Speaker 2 (59:06):
That's right, exactly , and then nothing gets wasted.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
We ran over a porcupine on the way into camp
and I pulled the quills out andthey threw the body on the back.

Speaker 2 (59:15):
That's tasty critter.

Speaker 1 (59:17):
Protein doesn't get wasted over there.
Where's Blood Origin's heading?
If we've talked about theorigins, what's the blood future
?
I don't, you know, we can'tcrystal ball this, but where do
you want it to head?

Speaker 2 (59:32):
Honestly, I want us to be the Like.
I think we're the spirit tipnow for hunting issues around
the world.
If something hits around theworld, the majority of the
hunting community Not themajority the hunting community
looks to us and goes, huh,what's he gonna say about it?
Or what are they saying aboutit, what did they put out about
it?
I want to be even more of thatspirit tip.

(59:54):
So I want and to be able to dothat, we have to be super nimble
.
We have to be super on the balleverywhere around the world.
So if something happens inAustralia and people are looking
for information on Thing X,we're the first things that are
popping up.
We've already got articles outthere, we've really talked about

(01:00:16):
it, we've really We've gotpodcasts about it, we've got
videos about it.
We're just we're there.
And so the news that needsthat's going to surround that
issue is going to be full ofinformation from us, because
that's where they're going togather the information from, and

(01:00:36):
that information is going to betruthful and authentic and
shape a different narrative forhunting in those big medium
forums, which is the ultimate.

Speaker 1 (01:00:48):
Do you do much TV stuff Like I can picture
Listening to what you're sayingthere I can picture that's one
of the worst news channels here,but we've got the project on
most nights of the week andthey'll cross to a specialist on
knee surgeries or whatever andis that the sort of 100% Like.
If there's a duck conversation,let's cross to Robbie from

(01:01:09):
Blood Oceans to talk about it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:11):
Yeah, and ideally we have someone in Australia that's
our point person who is Likethey know how we speak, they
know how to speak, and they'relike, hey, we have a hunting
topic and we want to bring anexpert in for To have a debate
around hunting.
Whether it's me coming on orsomeone else coming on, we want

(01:01:31):
to be that person.

Speaker 1 (01:01:33):
I think yeah, and that's when you said you're
lulled in your Facebook page.
I think the struggle would bethe accent and the background
and not being in Australia.

Speaker 2 (01:01:43):
So Agreed, totally agree.

Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
Yeah, you probably tell me off here or not, but
have you found someone inAustralia that's like that?
Not yet.
Why aren't they doing italready?
Was my next question.

Speaker 2 (01:01:56):
It's just, I think it's a matter you know for me.
I look at myself.
You just need to you get tothat point in your life where
you're like, hey, that's what Iwant to do and I'm super
passionate about it, and I justneed to find that person who's

(01:02:17):
at that point in their career.
That's like we want.
I want that, I like that ideaand I'm willing to sacrifice a
couple of years.
Now, double down, I've got agood job, but know that you know
, in the future, blood OriginsAustralia will be a nonprofit
organization in Australiaraising enough money in

(01:02:40):
Australia to fund someone'ssalary in Australia.
And there'll be me in Australiabut someone else running it and
raising money and doing whatwe're supposed to do.

Speaker 1 (01:02:57):
Do you do trade shows and things now?

Speaker 2 (01:03:00):
Oh yeah, Two.
Well, it's a show season now.
Yeah, starts Wednesday.
I've got 45 days literally onthe road starting in two days
time All the shows in America,and then there's no, dear expo.
No, we just walk the show floorbecause I don't know.

(01:03:21):
At this.
We're not at a point yet that Iwrestle in my brain Like what
do I?
What would I get out of puttinga booth up?
Brand awareness, of course,people stopping in and going, oh
, I've seen these guys, you know.
So that would be one.
And two would be raising money.

(01:03:41):
I could we have like this, likedear expo.
Last year, I wanted to have abooth at dear expo.
I wanted to have a bloodorigins booth, australia booth.
I don't think we were ready forit.
We will be.
If they're not having it thisyear, so we're not.
We don't need to be ready forthis year, but if they have it
in 2025, we're certainly goingto be ready.
And then raise money like havea, have a good raffle, like have

(01:04:08):
a gun or have something coolthat sounds like, hey, sign up
to be a supporter or buy thisraffle ticket right now and by
the end of the weekend,someone's winning this gun.
So no, right now we just walkthe floors.
It's a lot of businessdevelopment, making sure, again,
we're still introducingourselves to people, still

(01:04:28):
getting people brand aware.

Speaker 1 (01:04:32):
I think that I've done trade shows and I think
I've done them both ways boothand no booth, both beneficial
for different reasons.
But looking from the outside,you probably get more benefit
just walking, because the peopleyou're talking to are the other
booth holders and you've got alot of freedom.
When you're on a booth, you'retalking to punters who are just

(01:04:52):
stuck in front of your three bythree that are cruising past and
it's a.
You get a more in depthconversation but you don't get
to spread that across.
Maybe the people that wouldactually help blood origins in
the future and that's the otherbooth holders Correct, if they
know about it, that they'retelling the people in front of
their booths and it's actuallyspreading the seed a little bit
further.

Speaker 2 (01:05:12):
Yeah, and they you know those, those other booths
are potential conservation clubmembers.
They're companies that want tobecome a conservation club
member.
They're outfitters that wouldbe interested in donating a hunt
to us.
They're outfitters that we wantto talk about their impact on
people, on wildlife, oncommunities, the things that
they're doing.
That will showcase hunting inthe greatest light possible.

(01:05:35):
So that's where we're at rightnow and I love it.
I absolutely love it, and thenext 45 days are going to be
rough, but they're all rough onmy voice and rough on my liver,
but they'll be good.

Speaker 1 (01:05:51):
I'm glad I got you now, before that started.
I'm jealous I'd.
Yeah, the show season overthere is not not one I've been
to.
Usually when I was guiding overthere, I'd come home in
December, late December, doChristmas over here and then
head back over in in the fall.
But Dallas.

Speaker 2 (01:06:09):
Safari Club is the first one in two days, and the
first event of the year is theweatherby, which is a big black
tie event on Wednesday night andit's like you just cannot shake
enough hands because everyone'ssuper excited to see everyone.
You haven't seen each other ina year.
Yeah, it's pretty fun.

Speaker 1 (01:06:26):
Yeah, some big money flowing around those rooms.

Speaker 2 (01:06:28):
Oh, that weatherby room, jeez, is it in?
Quite only no, you can buy aticket to the weatherby because
they raising money for their owninternal foundation and they
have a big auction.
I know the auctioneer very well, who does the weatherby auction
every year, and he says it'sthe hardest auction that he has

(01:06:48):
to do every year because he hasa.
He has a time period betweenthe end of dinner and the award
of the weatherby, which is likean hour and a half window, and
he has to sell 25 things in anhour and a half and everyone
isn't really paying attentionbecause everyone's still
visiting, you know, wanting tocatch up and whatnot.
It's the toughest and it's alsothe richest crowd in the world

(01:07:12):
that have done every single huntunder the sun, and so he's
trying to sell a buffalo hunt tosome, to a crowd that has
hunted buffalo 10 times over.

Speaker 1 (01:07:21):
Yes, yeah, selling ice to Eskimos.
Yep Is.
Can you explain what theweatherby award is?
Just?

Speaker 2 (01:07:30):
It's a.
It's an award.
The weatherby award is an awardfor someone who has killed the
most animals in the world.
Yeah, every year.

Speaker 1 (01:07:43):
No, period yeah, each year they award it, though.

Speaker 2 (01:07:48):
Each year they award it.
But the guy who's winning ittoday is killing I think it's
it's right at like 380 to 400different animals in the world
and it's probably costing himsix to eight mil to hit that
number.
It's no, no, no period for theentire 380 400.

(01:08:11):
So the to get like 280 animalsis pretty simple Dare I say
pretty simple, but to get from280 to like over 350, the last
70 to 100 animals are very rareanimals and very pricey.
Yeah so fun room to hang aroundFun room.

(01:08:35):
But you know it's, it's yourtypical.
You know old white guys thathave been around for a long time
, that have a lot of money, thathave literally been.
You know these weatherby guyshunt 300 days a year, 310 days a
year.

Speaker 1 (01:08:51):
It's a full time job.

Speaker 2 (01:08:52):
Full time job to win the weatherby, dedicated like
five, six years of hunting likethat.

Speaker 1 (01:08:59):
It's a good room for you to be in.
I mean, imagine if just one ofthose guys come on board and
dropped a fraction of that intothe.

Speaker 2 (01:09:07):
No, they do, dude, and this is like last.
Three years ago I approachedthe weatherby and I said I've
got an idea I wanted, I want toraise money.
I don't want to auctionanything off, I want to raise
money for a video series calledthe proof.
And they're like ah, we don'tknow, why don't you just do a
little pamphlet?
We'll put it on everyone'stable.
They can fill in their creditcard information.

(01:09:28):
And I was like man, I don'tthink that's going to work.
Okay, no problems.
Well, within like two days, theweatherby they're like oh, by
the way, we're going to put youritem as the last auction item.
It's not even going to beprinted, they'll just say it
after the last auction item as ajust an FYI.
I was like okay, cool, so I'min, so I've got a video.

(01:09:49):
I made a video, put it in.
And again, I know theauctioneer very well and he
knows me, he knows blood origins, and so he finished the last
auction item and then he stoppedeveryone and said hey, I just
want to let you know we've got aspecial auction item now, right
now, and I want you to watchthis video.
And so we have this reallycrazy cool video that everyone

(01:10:09):
was just like what is this?
And then John Bay said look,we're going to raise money for
this documentary series.
It's not an auction item, it'sa paddle race.
Who wants to give $10,000?
Dodge?
Like six people's hands went upand then 5,000.
And then someone in the frontsaid I'll give you 25,000 dodge.

(01:10:30):
We raised a hundred and $10,000.
And everyone in the room waslike what just happened?
Cause it, it, it was.
It was the highest item of thenight times three.

Speaker 1 (01:10:45):
Wow.
Were you in the room, obviously.

Speaker 2 (01:10:48):
Oh yeah, I was in the front of the room.
It was unbelievable.
I was just because I wasnervous as get out all day, like
I was.
Like we're going to raisenothing, okay, we'll raise 20 or
something.
Yeah, we raised that and that'swhat's allowed us to do the Zim
documentary, the Zambiadocumentary, and now we have got
a big elephant documentarycoming out of Botswana and we

(01:11:09):
did a Spanish documentary.
So it just allowed us to dosome really cool pieces that
nobody's ever done before.

Speaker 1 (01:11:17):
So hope to go back next year.
Yeah, do you get theopportunity to present something
at this option to say this iswhere the money went?

Speaker 2 (01:11:24):
They don't like like highlighting people, which is
weird.
But next year I'm going toapproach them for next year and
say I want to do it again, andhere's a video.
We'll create a video that showshey, three years ago we came to
you and we asked for yourgenerosity and this is what it
did.
Um, can we do it again?

(01:11:44):
You see?

Speaker 1 (01:11:47):
I'm not trying to get a ticket.

Speaker 2 (01:11:49):
Yeah, come on, it's a brilliant show.
You should, you should totallytry and get to Dallas.
It's a brilliant show 950vendors, all hunts from all
across the world and the bestpart is the guns at the show is
unbelievable.
You know, from any gun you wantto the, you know $150,000

(01:12:11):
shotguns that you can pick upand touch and look at them.

Speaker 1 (01:12:16):
That's.
That's just teasing.
The problem is my bank accountwould be empty before I left.

Speaker 2 (01:12:23):
Yeah, and you have to buy a raffle ticket next year,
so you can't really come again.

Speaker 1 (01:12:26):
Well, I need to just get my preference points.

Speaker 2 (01:12:28):
That's right, exactly .

Speaker 1 (01:12:30):
Right, yeah, rob, thanks for coming on is norm
with Acura at hunts.
Podcasts go in your multipledirections, and that's that's
how I like it.
We've covered a lot ofdifferent topics.
It's a good fun one, so Iappreciate your advice too.
You've been, you know, talkinga lot longer than I have in
doing these things, so you'vehelped me be able to word my
feelings a little bit better inthe future.

(01:12:50):
But I look forward to catchingup with you, be online or in
person, or if you are comingover to visit your family.
And thank you for being onboard.
Yeah, 100% Australia too.

Speaker 2 (01:13:01):
No, thank you, man, and congrats on the podcast.
Coming back and smashing numberone in the wilderness category,
that's huge Well done.

Speaker 1 (01:13:10):
Thanks, I appreciate that, no worries.
Well, thanks for being andeveryone.
Thanks for listening, thanksfor watching, till next time.
Cheers For those of youwatching and maybe those
listening.
You might notice things havechanged.
We're back again.
I've grabbed Robbie for a quicklittle morning chin wave

(01:13:30):
because some things have comeabout.
Since we recorded the firsttime We've been chatting a lot
and come up with some really funthings and, robbie, you pitched
something to me the other dayand I was too good to not record
.
So tell us what you've got.

Speaker 2 (01:13:43):
Yeah, I appreciate it , man.
You know it's something westarted in South Africa last
year and it worked really reallywell, and so we wanted to
implement it in the Australianlandscape and it's called the
conservation levy program andreally it's a very simplistic
idea in that a lot of peoplehunt.
They come to Australia and hunt.
Locals pay to hunt and could weadd a small, small conservation

(01:14:06):
levy on the animals that arehunted in Australia?
It's going to depend on theperson and the outfit and the
type of animal you're chasing,and we'll work with every
outfitter to determine like whatconservation levy they want to
apply to the animals and to thehunt.
But it's essentially like thePutman Robertson Act here in the

(01:14:28):
United States in that thatsmall percentage, that levy,
will funnel right back intoAustralia and allow us to do the
things that we do or we'regoing to do, and you're going to
see that very, very shortlyit's going to come to fruition.
Within a couple of monthsYou're going to start seeing
some things that will go holysmokes.
They weren't joking, they'redoing things.

Speaker 1 (01:14:51):
I'm excited for that because I kind of have an
inkling of what some of thosethings might be.
But just from an accurate huntspoint of view, I had some
clients the other week and inbetween our first recording and
now I mentioned to them and theysaid what a great idea is some
of our money going towards it?
And I said, yes, accurate huntsis in Amazing, amazing.

Speaker 2 (01:15:13):
And that's the thing, it's just seed money, right,
that's the way that we'relooking at it.
It's just small little seedsand if we can get a number of
outfitters around Australia tosay, yes, we're in with small
seeds, at the end of the day itreally doesn't cost the outfit
or anything.
It's a, it's a levy on theclient.
Some clients are going to beobstinate and go oh, I don't

(01:15:37):
want to do that.
But up until now and you justexperienced it we have yet to
find someone that says no, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:15:48):
And framed in the right conversation.
I can't see any negativesbehind it.
So, definitely somethingaccurate hunts is keen to get on
board with, and we'll continueto do it so.

Speaker 2 (01:15:59):
Well, we appreciate you.
And if anybody else islistening out there that has an
outfit in Australia that sellshunts, yeah let us know.
We'd love to, we'd love toenroll you guys in the
conservation levy program inAustralia.
That will, the money will stayin Australia to do the good work
that we want to do in Australia.

Speaker 1 (01:16:20):
Something we didn't touch on in the last one was you
have a subscription based or adonation based monthly for those
that let's say a lot of huntingin Australia is done free, like
free.
Let's say so.
No, no outfit is involved, sohow can those people chip in?

Speaker 2 (01:16:36):
Yeah, so we've got two models.
We have the general Joe blowpublic model, which is a
supporters program, which is wecall it the cost of a cup of
coffee a month.
Go down to the local cafe andyou want to order your beautiful
flat whites in Australia,you're probably costing you six
bucks seven bucks, right forthat coffee.
Instead of you having 20coffees a month, just have 19

(01:17:01):
and send $7 to us and all ofthat money adds up again at the
end of the day.
And then the other thing thatI'm super keen on is we've got a
corporate conservation club.
We've got a couple ofAustralian companies that
support us.
It ranges from 20 and this isall in US dollars, but $25 a

(01:17:23):
month, all the way up to a crazyamount a month.
And we just want good companiesinvolved in what we do, whether
that be in the outdoor space.
We have I don't think we haveanybody in Australia that is not
in the outdoor space, but I'mkeen to bring somebody on like
that.
But I've got an engineeringcompany in New Zealand that
supports us.
I really am truly interested inhaving just like Regular

(01:17:46):
companies join the conservationclub.
I've got an insurance companyin Arkansas, a stone mason in
Kansas Oil pipeline company inTexas.
Those are the kinds ofcompanies that you know, people,
they hunt their own companiesand they're like, oh yeah, we
can, we can stick away 50 bucksa month or a hundred bucks a
month or something like that.

(01:18:07):
Like you said, it's all seedsand seeds planted together,
exactly, exactly.
So, yeah, any, any which way,and then if you don't feel like
that you can donate monetarily,then there's other ways, like
certain outfitters, you know.
If they've got a hunt that theywant to donate to us, we can
raffle off a hunt, raise moneythat way.
Lots of other things that wecan.

(01:18:29):
You know we're always open toideas.
Well, I think that's a greatidea.

Speaker 1 (01:18:33):
Speaking of ideas and thanks for jumping back on and
throwing that bit there thereand again for everyone listening
and watching.
Thanks for being here.